Oh, what a fun it is to ride!
by takitaka
Summary: "A Russian, a Pole, a German and a French ride together in one sleigh. Suddenly a pack of wolves starts chasing them…" Or in other words Hetalia story based on a joke. Translation from Polish, more info inside. Warning: black humor!


A/N: There is a joke. A Polish joke, it's important to note. It starts with "A Russian, a Pole, a German and a French ride together in one sleigh. Suddenly a pack of wolves starts chasing them…"

You can find out what happens next by reading this little fic, based on said joke and originally written in Polish by Helisse. Link to the original: fanfiction. net/ s/ 6484910/

Big thanks to her for letting me translate it and to Yuuago for being my beta :)

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><p>"Can't we, y'know… go a bit faster?" Poland asked, his teeth chattering. His nose seemed to change into a dripping tap, not that he could even feel it anymore, his eyes teary from the freezing wind. He could barely keep his grip on the sleigh with his hands completely stiff from cold. Thankfully at least Russia felt pity on him enough to lend him his funny furry hat, or else his ears would surely have fallen off by now.<p>

All in all, his situation wasn't the best. He was traveling through a snow-covered Russian forest, sitting in an equally ice-covered Russian sleigh and it looked like he was about to get eaten by a pack of Russian wolves – that were not covered by snow nor ice, mind you, since if they were, maybe he would have a chance of making it alive in the end.

If only he'd known it'd end up like that, he'd have definitely chased off that stupid Frenchman with a shotgun!

But what did have France to do with any of this? Well, truth be told, quite a lot.

Two days ago France had paid Poland a visit, wanting to discuss their next year snail delivery. Frankly, Poland simply could not grasp the French obsession with eating all that slimy stuff, but business is business. And gave him cash.

They'd made a deal fairly quickly and then France had suddenly taken out a bottle of his "Shato-de-something" to celebrate. Naturally after celebrating for quite a while they'd felt kind of nostalgic. France had tried to feel him up a bit too, probably hoping that tipsy meant easy, but of the two of them it was Poland who had higher alcohol tolerance, so that plan had failed quite spectacularly.

They ended up talking about good old times instead and soon felt compelled to take a trip down memory lane – and quite literally decided to do that by paying a visit to their old friend/enemy/neighbor –

Russia.

Stupid, oh, so very stupid idea. But they were drunk, so it doesn't count!

Anyway after that decision everything went downhill amazingly fast. Before Poland could blink all three of them were creeping carefully through the border, wary of Belarus and praying to not be noticed. "Three of them" – because Prussia joined them somewhere on the way. Poland suspected France tipped him off since they had that strange kind of friendship going on when they weren't fighting over Alsace and Lorraine.

It was actually kind of weird, going east like that. At first Prussia made fun of them, reminding him that tragic retreat with Napoleon in 1812, but he shut up after being kindly enlightened that Poland was the only one able to conquer Moscow. Okay, it was only for two years and Russia was sort of confused at the time, not even sure who he wanted to have on his throne, but damn it, Poland could still put it in his CV, so there.

Right after the Belarussian-Russian border and not without a bit of consternation they run into Russia himself. He explained to them that he was taking care of some business or another, but he tried to do it quietly so Belarus wouldn't find out. He got absolutely delighted upon seeing them and all of a sudden invited them to his dacha and promised other attractions such as a sleigh party in Pskov Oblast forest.

They were busy wondering just how to get themselves out of that situation when unexpectedly a voice could be heard.

"Brother? Is that you?"

They all made off like a shot.

And that's precisely how they ended up with Russia on his sleigh. At first it wasn't so bad if you didn't count the below zero temperature and freezing wind. Russia seemed pretty happy too, humming something quietly to himself and not making any alarming comments about changing borders.

And just when Poland decided it was worth trying to relax (as much as one could relax being as cold as he was) a howl echoed through the forest. Answering France's timid question Russia explained that it was probably just the local wolves setting out for a hunt, absolutely nothing to worry about!

Of course ten minutes later it became clear that they were meant to be the local wolves' main course.

It was _just_ Poland's damn luck.

And so we're back to the beginning of our story, namely to the four nations crammed into one sleigh and speeding through a snowy forest, chased determinedly by quite a lot of wolves that were also progressively managing to get dangerously close.

"But I'm totally serious here, can't we go faster?" Poland repeated a bit shakily, turning nervously to check their backs. The predators were running quietly – since they already sniffed and located their prey they apparently saw no reason to make more noise than necessary.

"I know you're serious here, _Pol'sha_" Russia muttered, urging on the horses. "But no, we cannot go any faster".

After hearing that France shuddered and started to mumble some sort of litany. Probably in old French since it had that bit of Germanic feeling into it.

_Well well well, s__o secular all the time, but when in fear, God in dear_, Poland thought absently, but stopped himself from saying this out loud. It really wasn't the time.

"_Scheisse_! What the fuck is that shit?" Prussia raved somewhere on the other side of the sleigh. Apparently the prospect of becoming east Slavic wolves' dinner wasn't an awesome enough way to go.

France's praying was sounding more and more gibberish and Poland took off his gloves to nervously bite at his nails since his hands were so cold it really didn't make any difference at this point.

One of the wolves sped up and got alarmingly close to the sleigh. Poland was cursing himself for this totally idiotic idea of willingly crossing the Russian border when suddenly Russia turned around, grabbed the now-completely hysteric France and promptly threw him out to the wolves. A loud, piercing scream cut through the air along with a rattle, satisfied yap and other sounds of turmoil.

Immediately a heavy silence fell upon the sleigh. Prussia and Poland stared in shock at Russia who, letting out contented sigh, looked back to the horses.

"Now they'll leave us alone for a while" he said conversationally. The two nations decided to not comment after thinking about it.

For the next few moments Poland was staring numbly at his shoes, trying to get his upset stomach to calm down and not think of the phrase "for a while" too much.

When they heard the howling once again he wasn't surprised—actually, he was expecting that. He didn't even panic when Russia off-handedly got rid of their Prussian companion.

The panic still didn't come when the wolves got closer to them for the third time, when they almost made it to Russia's house. His thoughts were strangely calm; he waited.

He reacted only when right by the house Russia suddenly stopped the sleigh and— bent down to get the AK-47 from under his seat and shot out a short burst, killing the leader and two other wolves. The rest ran away with a whine.

Poland literally felt his blood boil.

"You sick bastard! You, _you_–!" his voice cracked with something; he simply couldn't find words to describe the crazy situation. "What are you even _thinking_? If you had that Kalash all the freaking time why didn't you use it earlier? Why the _fuck_ did you throw them out?"

Yelling at Russia was never a smart thing to do and definitely so when he was still holding a gun, but Poland was totally beyond the point of caring.

Although Russia didn't even look slightly irritated; more like a little surprised and after a while he looked at Poland pitifully.

"_Pol'sha_, are you stupid or what?" he asked slowly, reaching into his coat. Poland froze, holding his breath.

"One bottle for _four_?" And then Russia showed him indeed a bottle with a familiar transparent liquid.

For fuck's sake, that sonofa…

Poland felt like something in his head creaked, screeched and with a lingering wail simply stopped working. He looked at the bottle and then at Russia's encouraging smile.

Then at the bottle again.

He shrugged.

"I… took _kiełbasa_ just in case, it's gonna be fabulous for a snack."

Russia beamed at him.

"_Nu, maladets_!"

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><p>Notes:<p>

Poland is one of the main suppliers of snails to France.

"Russia was sort of confused at the time" – Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth occupied Moscow during Russian Times of Troubles and let me tell you that this name is really accurate for what was going on then — en. wikipedia. org/ wiki/ Time_of_Troubles

Dacha – a Russian seasonal or year-round second home often located in the exurbs of Soviet and post-Soviet cities — en. wikipedia. org/ wiki/ Dacha

French secularism – a concept denoting the absence of religious involvement in government affairs; France is the most secular country in Europe — en. wikipedia. org/ wiki/ French_secularism

Kalash – slang for AK47 — en. wikipedia. org/ wiki/ Ak47

Kiełbasa – Polish sausage, eaten also as a snack to vodka.

"Nu, maladets" – Russian for "well done!", "good job!"

To be clear; the joke itself ends after the Russian answers something along the lines of: "oh, Pole, you're silly; how would we share one bottle of vodka between four people?", making Russian's reason the punchline here. I should probably put a warning about the black humour, but, well, one of the genres _is_ horror, after all ;)


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